The product-selling strategy under direct and indirect value identification

Abstract

Direct value identification refers to the consumer-perceived value for a product itself. In the era of We-Media, consumers may also have indirect value identification for a product which stems from their fondness and emotional identification for some key opinion leaders (KOLs). To investigate the possible impacts of indirect value identification on product-selling strategy, and further explore the potential power of KOLs in green-product marketing, this paper analyzes the optimal product-selling strategy under direct and indirect value identification for firms producing and selling regular or green products. Results show that the optimal product-selling strategy is affected by the two kinds of value identification in a relatively independent way. Specifically, the fraction of followers in the whole consumer population and the relative marketing cost of KOLs affect the selling strategy while the marginal green production cost decides the product strategy.